My first month since joining Paddle

2 minute read

I joined Paddle about 3 months ago, a couple of months after moving to the UK, having worked in finance teams across Portugal and Brazil. I hadn’t heard of Paddle before, but the role looked really interesting!

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Joining Paddle

I joined Paddle about 3 months ago, a couple of months after moving to the UK, having worked in finance teams across Portugal and Brazil. I hadn’t heard of Paddle before, but the role looked really interesting!

My first month

My onboarding was really nice. The week before I started my manager, Tanya, got in touch: checking in to see what equipment I’d like to have, giving me info about the culture of the company and sending over onboarding paperwork.

The day I started I found everything I needed on my desk (a small but useful detail!). Tanya and our CFO Hugo sat down with me to run through the history of Paddle, how it worked and how the finance team was structured. I was then introduced to the all other teams one by one, followed by a team lunch.

I had a chance to learn more about the other teams the next day, and I had individual meetings with each team leader to learn a little bit more about what they were working on.

It did take me 2 weeks to remember everyone’s name but by now I can recognize who’s saying “good morning” or “see you tomorrow” without looking (most of the time…(!)).

I think the biggest change for me was that I had only worked in big companies before, and moving to a 30 person startup, with an informal and relaxed environment, felt quite odd in the first few days. Now I feel like at home and I really like it.

The hardest part

Understanding the complexity: I received lots of new information, new terms, new ways of doing things… Having never worked in a tech business before there were loads of things to pick up.

For instance we regularly have what we call “Lunchtime Learning” talks by other colleagues, where they teach the rest of the company about something they’re an expert in, or are working on. The more technical ones done by developers were a new world to me, with a lot to learn!

But altogether I like a good challenge and I feel that here I can grow and learn much more.

The best part

My first High Five on 15 Five :). It’s a weekly employee feedback tool, where people can also highlight someone who really helped out that week. I must say it feels good to see your job recognised, and that’s not something that happened often in the big companies where I worked!

The other 2 best parts

There are 2 things I like most at Paddle.

It’s a challenging job with differents areas to cover and plenty of ongoing projects - it may not sound like a good thing but it really makes our job very dynamic. It’s not routine work and I haven’t had two consecutive weeks where I did the same task.

My other favourite thing is that we work as a team, no matter which department you’re in.

Why you should join us

I can think of 2 reasons: it’s a big project with great people, where you can grow and learn.

And it’s a company which gives you opportunities, recognises your work and cares about you. You’re not a number here, you are a person.